The Searchers: Canberra gig a tribute to 50 years of Mersey Beat

The Beatles had signed their first record deal and were about to begin work on Love Me Do. Gerry and the Pacemakers' first three singles reached number one on the UK charts. Following in their wake were Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Cilla Black, the Swinging Blue Jeans, the Merseybeats and the Searchers, who racked up a string of hits, including Sweets for My Sweet, Sugar and Spice, Needles and Pins, When You Walk in the Room, Don't Throw Your Love Away and Love Potion No 9.

Scan forward to 2015 and the Searchers – John McNally, Frank Allen, Spencer James and Scott Ottaway – have just embarked on an Australian anniversary tour to mark their first visit here in 1964. They play 26 Australian dates in just over a month.

"We've got anniversaries coming out of every orifice at the moment," says Frank Allen who along with McNally is a survivor from the band's early days. "It's 50 years since we began, 50 years since I joined, 50 years since the first number one, 50 years since touring Australia for the first time."

"We manage to keep it up, we keep fit, and we love what we do. We play around 200 shows a year … maybe we should ease off.

"The band is run by John McNally and myself. We preserve the history, the legacy if you like. We've kept our fans and added new ones over the years. The loyalty we get from fans lets us know how we are travelling."

It's interesting to note – though what it means is open to interpretation – that both the Beatles and the Searchers started as skiffle groups, both learnt to play in the red light district of Hamburg, both were there at the embryonic stirrings of British rock'n'roll, and both started their run at fame and fortune in primitive Liverpool underground clubs. For the Searchers it was the Iron Door Club, the first venue where the Beatles played as the Silver Beetles for the first time, and both sold a shed-load of records (the Searchers over 45 million).

"We were Liverpool teenagers playing for fun," says Allen."And then we became international pop stars. British music had never really taken off in the States, we were living the dream life."

"It was incredible. Heaven. We were handing American music back to them. It was a dream. One of our first gigs in New York was Murray the K's show at the Fox Theatre in Brooklyn. It was seven days a week, six shows day, playing on a bill that included Marvin Gaye, the Supremes, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, the Temptations, Martha and the Vandellas, Dusty Springfield, the Contours, the Shangri-las and the Ronettes."

Rather than feeling overshadowed by the Beatles, they are thankful for the Fab Four's reflected limelight.

"It was such an important period [the early 60s], it was all down to the Beatles," Allen says. "Every one of us who made it should get down on their knees and thank the Beatles. Some people might have made it on their own but the Beatles changed the whole perception of group music and northern [UK] music. I've so much to thank them for."

But it's not all been beer and skittles for the Searchers. After the heydays came the dog days. McNally recalls times in the 1970s when the hits dried up and bills had to be paid. "It's what I call our chicken-in-the-basket period when we played all the cabaret and social clubs," he says.

"The social clubs in the north-east were the worst. I still remember at one place when we were going through our biggest hits When You Walk in the Room, we suddenly heard someone reading out the tote numbers for the night."

Now that the Searchers, who took their name from a 1956 cowboy film starring John Wayne, have their careers back in harness as a "heritage" act, those sour experiences may tempt lesser acts to become cynical and take short cuts in the good times … say with some lip syncing or pre-recorded tracks.

"Never," says Allen. "We highly disapprove and so many bands, even from our own era, are sadly embellishing their sound with pre-recorded instruments and voices. It has become the norm and the audience doesn`t appear to mind. In the 60s virtually all TV shows were mimed. The equipment wasn`t there to deal with the logistics of balancing groups but those decisions were not ours to make. But on stage we are live."

But McNally has come clean about the authenticity of the 12-string guitar sound that is said to have inspired a generation of guitar band, including the Byrds. "We never used one," McNally says. "It was just the engineer who put a reverb on the recording [Needles and Pins] and it sounded like a 12-string. After that we had to go out and buy 12-string guitars."

The Searchers anniversary tour hits Canberra on Friday, February 27, at Erindale Vikings. For tickets call 6121 2131 or email events@vikings.com.au.